Thursday, December 27, 2012

OTTAWA — The federal government’s tough-on-crime agenda is
“excessively punitive” for youth and is a step backwards for Canada’s
child rights record, says a United Nations group.

The UN committee on the rights of the child has finished a 10-year
review of how Canada treats its children and how well governments are
implementing the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

In particular, the committee says Canada’s Youth Criminal Justice Act
complied with international standards until changes were introduced
earlier this year.

The Harper government’s Bill C-10 — an omnibus crime bill that
includes stiffer penalties for youth and makes it easier to try them as
adults — no longer conforms to the child rights convention or other
international standards.

Bill C-10 “is excessively punitive for children and not sufficiently
restorative in nature,” the committee wrote in a report published over
the weekend.

“The committee also regrets there was no child rights assessment or
mechanism to ensure that Bill C-10 complied with the provisions of the
convention.”

The committee also repeatedly expressed its concern that aboriginal
and black children are dramatically overrepresented in the criminal
justice system. Aboriginal youth are more likely to be jailed than
graduate from high school, the report said.

In order to meet the standards of the UN convention, Ottawa should
raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility and ensure that no one
under 18 is ever tried as an adult, the report said.

Authorities should also be developing alternatives to detention,
writing rules to restrain the use of force against children in detention
and to separate girls from boys in jail, the committee added.

Governments should determine why so many aboriginal and black
children and youth are involved in the criminal justice system and
figure out how to reduce the disparity, the report recommended.

The committee also chastised Canada for failing to provide equal
social services to aboriginal children — especially in the realm of
child welfare, an issue now before Canadian courts.

It accused authorities of “serious and widespread discrimination” in
the services they offer aboriginal children, visible minorities,
immigrants and children with disabilities.

“The UN joins the auditor general, leading experts and First Nations
in calling on the federal government to step up to the plate and ensure
equity for First Nations children,” said advocate Cindy Blackstock of
the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society.
“There is simply no excuse for a government to discriminate against children.”

The child rights convention is a binding international treaty that
Canada ratified in 1991. Signatories are obliged to defend their child
rights’ records and explain progress at regular intervals before a UN
committee.

Canadian officials appeared before the committee two weeks ago.

Justice Minister Rob Nicholson rejects the claim that his crime
legislation does not comply with the child rights’ convention, said
spokeswoman Julie Di Mambro.

The legislation was amended to ensure no one under the age of 18 is detained in an adult facility, she noted.

“Our legislation reflects the need to protect society from serious
and violent young offenders,” Di Mambro said. “It targets the small
number of violent, repeat young offenders and its measures are balanced,
effective, and responsible.”

Previously in the House of Commons, Conservative parliamentary
secretary Bob Dechert lashed out at the UN committee because one of its
members is from Syria.

“Syria, a country whose rulers are stealing the innocence of an
entire generation of its children, is criticizing Canada,” he said.
“Imagine that.

“This is no doubt to distract from the atrocities that Syrian children are currently facing every day.”

But critics say Ottawa is wrong to write off the UN committee — even if Canada is not among the worst offenders.

“You can’t sign on to a treaty like the Convention on the Rights of
the Child without adhering to the guidelines that it lays out,” said
Jaskiran Dhillon, a representative for Justice for Girls.

“It sets an international bar for what treating and taking care of
your children and youth looks like. It doesn’t mean that you disregard
the most marginalized … populations of your country.”

The report also wants Canada to:

Adopt a national strategy to implement children’s rights, alleviate poverty and prevent violence.

Address high levels of violence against aboriginal women and girls.

Ensure child victims of violence have access to restraining orders and other means of protection.

Help troubled parents take better care of their children instead of sending them into foster care.

Ensure disabled children are not forced into segregated schooling.

Monitor the use of drugs to treat mental conditions in children, to curtail over-medication.

My heart goes out to the three women who had the misfortune to cross the path
of Nicholas Osuteye. We should consider all of these individuals victims of the
failing civil mental health system of care and a social safety net that fails
the most vulnerable and high-risk people every day in B.C.

As a social worker who has worked in psychiatric inpatient units with
individuals experiencing acute, severe and chronic psychiatric disorders, I can
tell you Mr. Osuteye's experience with B.C.'s acute psychiatric system is not
uncommon.

He also faced unique, made-in-B.C. structural barriers to receiving the help
and support he required, putting him and others at-risk.

Media reports suggest Mr. Osuteye voluntarily went to hospital because he
wanted help with medication. If Mr. Osuteye has been here for less than three
months, he would not meet the residency requirements for medical coverage under
the policies of the current health insurance regime of the B.C. government.Therefore, he likely had no way to pay for his stay in hospital and no way to
pay for medications, which would not be covered.

Mr. Osuteye also would not have met the residency requirements for applying
for crisis income assistance with the Ministry of Social Development if he were
here less than three months.

Even if he had access to a computer, which is how people must apply now, he
likely would not have been able to navigate the Byzantine application process
due to his acute illness.

If he had tried to call an office, he likely would have been unable to get
through to speak to a human being due to the automated telephone system which
bureaucratically ensures fewer people can successfully apply for income
assistance.

In my work as a psychiatric social worker at the Forensic Psychiatric
Hospital my colleagues and I saw clear anecdotal evidence that individuals who
were not receiving necessary civil mental health care, treatment and admission
to acute psychiatric units in local hospitals (if needed), or those who were
discharged before stabilization, and with a lack of solid discharge plans to
support them in the community, often ended up committing criminal code
violations while acutely mentally ill.

Many of these individuals go on to be found not criminally responsible on
account of mental disorder (NCRMD) and are then subject to lengthy time spent in
the much more expensive Forensic Psychiatric system that taxpayers are
funding.

In the last decade, the B.C. government has created grand mental health plans
for children, youth and adults, but their failure to adequately resource these
required systems of care has put many at risk.

Tragedies like this case occur because of the unspoken, unacknowledged
failure of the B.C. government for its lack of leadership, monitoring,
accountability and adequate funding of the mental health system of care. It is
time for them to take responsibility and to stop new tragedies from occurring.
They are the only ones who can do it.

Thursday, December 6, 2012

Over time I have become increasingly concerned about the ever-increasing force of the narratives of sexualization, violence and oppression of girls and women that have become common place in North American society.

A day cannot go by in which girls and women are not exposed to multiple depictions of media and stories that normalize gendered oppression. This oppression is deeply embedded in the structures and institutions of our society and it impacts the day-to-day well-being, safety and lives of girls and women.

Structural oppression impacts girls and women's employment and career choices and opportunities. It impacts our ability to financially support ourselves, our children and our elders. We must all continue to work together to achieve equality, to eliminate violence against girls and women. Boys and men are important partners in this fight against the oppression of girls and women. I believe that we can have equality and justice for all in Canada, it takes the will of the people working together to meet this goal.

YWCA Canada’s Rose Campaign to end violence against women and girls
takes its name from the rose button created after 14 young women were
murdered on December 6, 1989 and commemorates December 6 as Canada’s
National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women.

The
Rose Campaign works year-round to reduce violence against women,
increase public awareness and prevent violence before it starts.

Violence against women is a $4 billion problem in Canada. Each year,
violence and abuse drive over 100,000 women and children out of their
homes and into shelters. They face an uncertain future with a high risk
of homelessness and poverty.

You can take action to change their lives.

Send a rose campaign message to your MP.Donate to end violence against women and girls.

OTTAWA (December 4, 2012): On December 6, Canada
will focus once again on violence against women. The National
Association of Friendship Centres (NAFC) would like to take this
occasion to publicly support those communities across the country, and
the efforts of the Native Women’s Association of Canada, who are calling
on the Federal government to establish a public inquiry and a national
framework of action to address the issue of missing and murdered
Aboriginal women and girls in Canada. Aboriginal women are 3.5 times
more likely than non-Aboriginal women to be victims of violence.

Since the 1980s, it has been estimated that thousands of aboriginal
women have gone missing and have been murdered. Roughly half of the
official murders and disappearances have occurred since the year 2000.
At present, there are 583 documented cases. Unofficial accounts are
significantly higher. Aboriginal women between the ages of 25 and 44
are five times more likely than all other Canadian women in the same age
group to die as a result of violence.

Violence against aboriginal women has been at crisis levels for
years. It affects the individual, their families and the health of
thousands of communities across Canada. All levels of government and
law enforcement need to work with aboriginal and non aboriginal leaders
to prevent further injustice and build healthier communities. Existing
barriers must be eliminated so communities can begin to solve many of
these cases and to prevent this shame from continuing. Only then can
faith in the justice system be restored allowing for communities to come
together towards healthier outcomes.

Last year, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination against Women began an inquiry into murdered and missing
Aboriginal women in Canada. “Canadians need to recognize that
Aboriginal women play integral roles in communities across Canada. As
mothers, daughters, sisters, grandmothers and aunts, women who are
victims of violence should not suffer in silence. We have been hearing
their cries for years. In a country such as ours, leadership and
commitment are two first steps that will help us heal,” says Vera Pawis
Tabobondung, President, NAFC.

Friendship Centres throughout Canada have been working at the
community level focusing attention on violence against women working
with partners and other organizations to achieve the goal or reducing
and eliminating violence that exists at unacceptable levels. Aboriginal women
(First Nations, Inuit and Métis) are more than eight times more likely
to be killed by their intimate partner than non-Aboriginal women.

In 2013, the NAFC will lead a national Aboriginal awareness campaign
to decrease domestic human trafficking among Aboriginal peoples. The
NAFC will establish a National Aboriginal Advisory Committee (NAAC)
consisting of regional, youth and expert representation. The NAAC will
devise and lead a community engagement plan to gather insight from a
wide range of Aboriginal peoples across the country into the messaging
and formats the national campaign materials should assume. The project
will lead to an increase in knowledge sharing and awareness around
human trafficking and it will increase community capacity to combat
human trafficking.

To support the Native Women’s Association of Canada, we ask the
public to visit their website to learn more about violence against
Aboriginal women and to sign the petition calling for a national inquiry
at http://www.nwac.ca/programs/sisters-spirit.

Guest blogger Diana Guenther drew on extensive work experience in
social services to develop her Masters of Urban Studies thesis on
improving services for at-risk youth in BC. She shares some of her key
recommendations here:

Having worked with at risk youth for 15 years and in three different
countries, I have always been quite puzzled about the rudimentary and
limited professional, community-based and preventive services available
for children and youth in BC. After all, investing in children, youth
and family services is not only a hallmark of a caring and a just
society, it also makes economic sense. As a social worker noted in a report by Pivot Legal Society,

The public needs to recognize that it is either pay now
(providing supports, resources and placements) or pay later (jails,
youth detention, homelessness, school drop outs, gangs, mental health
and addiction issues)…

The history of provincial child, youth, family and social services in
BC is characterized by privatization, a fragmentation of service
delivery, underfunding, frequent restructuring and a business model
logic that frequently misses the mark. Important stakeholders do not
have a strong voice in the policy arena.

My research into the sector leads me to recommend the following changes:

1. Address the current democracy deficit in the social service sector:
The current configuration (centralized policy making and
de-centralized/privatized service delivery) has created fragmented
services and a competitive and dysfunctional policy environment, and has
sidelined too many stakeholders.

2. Return to social work and youth work values:
Managerialism and business logic has crept into every aspect of the sector...Continuity of care for at-risk youth needs to be one of the guiding principles of this sector.

3. Reduce the corporate orientation of the non-profit sector:
The non-profit model that I believe in has an ongoing connection and
dialogue with community members about the services needed, and is
accountable to the community and children and youth they serve. I would
like to see more social workers, youth workers, youth, parents,
academics, politicians, activists, municipal and provincial bureaucrats,
teachers, etc. as board members.

4. Invest in community-based youth services:
Community-based youth services that offer services to all youth but
focus some of their resources on vulnerable youth in order to stabilize
them in their communities should be enhanced. Many municipalities offer
some youth services through their recreation departments or community
centers. If municipal and provincial government would join
forces/resources, this model could be enhanced.5. Provide services for young adults/older youth leaving care
The vast majority of youth in care do not have the resources and/or life
skills to transition into independence at the age of 19. Even the most
privileged youth who come from supportive families rarely do. We need
more services for young adults leaving care.

6. Focus on the needs of aboriginal youth
Aboriginal youth are over-represented among marginalized and homeless
youth – according to research by the McCreary Centre, 57 % of
street-involved youth are aboriginal... There are big differences between healthy and struggling native
communities, aboriginal youth with and without Indian status, urban
aboriginal youth and aboriginal youth living on-reserve (with a
connection to community), first nations with and without settled land
claims. We need to focus our resources on the most disadvantaged
aboriginal youth, while also challenging the system which creates such
harmful differentiation.

These policy recommendations are based on my SFU Masters Research Project:
How have neoliberal shifts from the 1980s to the present day in social
welfare delivery changed the services provided to street youth in
Vancouver?The full text of this project can be found here: https://theses.lib.sfu.ca/thesis/etd6962

Saturday, November 10, 2012

In my work with a wide range of people, I've seen the difficulties that people suffer due invisible disabilities. One of those challenging conditions is Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD). Individuals living with this disability often experience heartbreaking realities unless they are able to receive consistent and caring support and access to community and professional resources to assist them in their struggles of daily life.

As mentioned below, once young people reach the age of majority, there is a harsh transition to adulthood, where few services and supports exist to help those with FASD. Accessing resources through Community Living BC is extraordinarily difficult due to their criteria for accepting people.

Adult mental health services are also extremely limited in being able to offer the complex support that those living with FASD require, although the majority of these individuals have co-morbid conditions, such as depression and anxiety disorders.

Sadly, there has been little progress on the part of the BC government in resourcing a comprehensive plan for supporting the transition of young people to adulthood and support for adults with FASD. I wish government's would stop spending funds on writing feel-good reports and actually do something to resource community and professional services. If this support was available, so many people would benefit.

The Ministry of Children and
Family Development in collaboration with other provincial ministries,
and in consultation with families, service providers, and clinical
experts has developed a plan that focuses on six important objectives:

British Columbians are aware of the risk of alcohol and substance use in pregnancy and of FASD as a lifelong disability.

All women of childbearing age and their partners and support systems have access to early support and follow-up.

All pregnant women and mothers experiencing substance use problems,
and their partners and support systems have access to focused
intervention and support.

Children, youth and adults living with FASD have access to timely diagnosis and assessment.

Children, youth and adults living with FASD and their families and
support networks have access to comprehensive and lifelong intervention
and support.

Service systems are coherent, integrated and coordinated, and benefit from strong research and evaluation.

********************************************

By Keith Rozendal, Vancouver SunNovember 9, 2012.

“All of a sudden she was gone.

“Boom — no reaction.
Her arms and legs started shaking. I called the nurse in. Within the
next 10 minutes they were doing a spinal tap without any anesthetic,
nothing.’

Lydia Neufeld’s 13-year-old foster daughter had slipped
away like this seven or eight times before, but this was the first time
her doctors had seen it. They had no explanation.
Neufeld’s
daughter has fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). While she grew in
the womb, her birth mother drank alcohol. The substance penetrated the
placenta and attacked the growing girl, leaving parts of her brain
permanently shrunk, scrambled, or simply missing.

That prenatal
injury stranded the Richmond teen in a world of noise and confusion. She
suffers these spells — paralyzing panic attacks — whenever her brain
can’t keep up with stimulation and rapid changes in her environment.

Hundreds
of thousands of Canadians live with a wide range of physical and
psychological disabilities caused by prenatal alcohol exposure,
according to Health Canada estimates. They’re born with irreversible
damage to brain and body. The injuries slow their childhood development,
hold them back in school, create a chaotic adolescence and leave them
unable to lead independent adult lives.

Complex disabilities

Neufeld’s
daughter wrote a letter explaining her disability — and why ambulances
sometimes rushed her from school — to her classmates.

“Because my
biological mom was drinking alcohol during pregnancy with me, my brain
was injured and works differently than your brain,” she told them. “I
can’t learn as fast as you. Sometimes I need to hear things over and
over to remember, but sometimes I still forget. It’s not because I’m
trying not to remember. I really just can’t.” Her letter had an impact.

“The
teachers were just in tears after listening to that letter,” Neufeld
said. “And the kids started to understand what it’s like. It changed her
life in school.”

This year, she’s resuming a full-time schedule of classes, after years of partial days.
Her
doctors call the panic attacks she suffers a secondary disability
because they’re best understood as being rooted in her brain’s inability
to meet everyday thinking challenges.
As the teenager explains,
“it is very hard to do stuff in school because of all the people and
noise. My brain can’t handle so many things happening at the same time.
Sometimes I can get very scared and I feel like my heart is going to
burst out of my chest.”

More than 90 per cent of adolescents with
FASD develop one or more mental health issues, including depression,
attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, substance abuse or aggressive
behaviours. These secondary disabilities sometimes produce the only
visible signs the person struggles with FASD.

“The more complex
behaviours — acting out, tantrums, blaming, lying, stealing, all those
things — are because they’re having their disability,” said Cheryl
Penner, a counsellor for families with FASD at the Touchstone Family
Association in Richmond. “When your little person is taking a tantrum on
the floor, it’s not just that they want to be bad — they’re acting out a
frustration and anger they don’t know how to cope with.”

Unfortunately,
the secondary disabilities look a lot like misbehaviour. People’s
misunderstanding lead them to see only kids behaving badly — telling
lies, stealing, breaking rules, and not listening to their parent’s
discipline. The children get in trouble at school. Out in public, their
parents see a lot of disapproving looks.

“They’re being labelled
as naughty children, when in fact they are disabled children,” said
neuropsychologist Val McGinn. “People often look at these children and
think, ‘Gosh, they’re dreadful parents.’ In fact, it’s a parent trying
to do their best trying to manage a disabled child.”

Circle of support

When
Audrey Salahub learned her adopted son had FASD, she began to surround
her family with a supportive community. She educated herself and her
Fraser Valley neighbours about the disorder.

“I thought, if my son
were to ever survive in this world, he would need to be able to be in
communities that knew about FASD,” she said.

One night, that vision of a protective circle of caring and understanding people crystallized in her mind.

“I saw this baby nestled in the petals of a lotus. I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s my son’,” she said.

“The
petals of the lotus circled him and cushioned him, protecting him so
that he could enjoy his life. I came to understand that this was about
the circle of support that we need to provide for our families and our
child. Each petal represents training and education and diagnosis and
all of those things we need. Also acceptance, understanding, compassion
and patience.”

The image became the logo of the Asante Centre, a
clinic providing diagnosis and social services for people with FASD,
which Salahub co-founded and where she now serves as executive director.

The
people and relationships in the life of a person with FASD have a big
influence on their success. Because the brain damage never resolves
itself, people with FASD rely upon a supportive community their whole
adult lives. Rather than independent living, they live lives of
interdependence. So do their parents.

Neufeld has come to rely
upon Penner, one of 69 provincial FASD key workers hired by the Ministry
of Children and Family Development to assist parents in raising
children with FASD. At one point, eight foster or adopted children with
special needs lived in Neufeld’s Richmond house. Her daughter, now 15
years old, lives with an 18-year-old brother and a 10-year-old sister
who also have an FASD.

The FASD key worker and parental support
program started in 2005. More than 50 social service agencies across the
province have contracted with the ministry to put key workers on staff.
Families can request the free help even before their child receives a
diagnosis. In a 2009 evaluation report, parents gushed with praise
for the program. Neufeld is one of many who developed a tight bond with
a key worker.

“If we didn’t have Cheryl Penner in the middle of our family, I don’t know what we would have done,” she said.

A personal touch

Penner
proved essential in helping Neufeld’s daughter avoid new panic attacks.
Together, the women created an innovative way to help the teen talk
about what triggered her attacks.

“She wasn’t able to verbalize
what she was worried about,” said Neufeld. “So I bought a bunch of small
little toys that would represent doctors, the ambulance, animals and
trees — any type of small toy she could play with in the sand and make a
picture. Then I would ask her what was happening and she would be able
to verbalize what she was feeling at the moment. She’d tell it like a
story.”

The solution emerged from the detailed understanding of
the girl’s specific disabilities and strengths, which was developed by
Penner, a core goal of the FASD key worker approach.

Neufeld’s daughter loves reading and is highly verbal. The sand play used these strengths to help her talk about her fears.

Building
on that storytelling gift, Penner then encouraged Neufeld’s daughter to
begin penning the letter she eventually read to her classmates.

The
letter supported another goal of the FASD key worker approach — to
create a network of caring adults and peers that can provide ongoing
support for the child when they are outside the family.

Key
workers support the Ministry of Education’s provincial outreach program,
helping public school teachers understand and accommodate their
students with FASD. In other formal and informal presentations, key
workers reach out to provide FASD education to all the important adults
in a child’s life.

“It is our job to try to make links,” said Sharon Lund, supervisor of the B.C. Children’s Foundation key worker program.

“Then
I have to hope that those links have gone to another person to support
that. We’re not really going to be staying in their life for a long
time. We need the individual, the parents, the caregivers, the foster
parents. Whatever their community is, we need them educated the same
ways because they are the ongoing support.”

Adult lives derailed

Unfortunately,
many young adults with FASD face a dramatic drop-off in social supports
when they turn 19. No longer considered minors, their access to the
provincial key worker program and many other children’s social services
end.

At the same time, most adult-oriented programs for the mentally handicapped remain closed to them.

Although
FASD hinders their ability to handle the demands of daily living, their
IQs scores tend to be near-normal, or fall just above the cutoffs that
qualify them for supports from Community Living British Columbia for
adults with developmental disabilities.

In response to their
plight, CLBC created the Personalized Supports Initiative in 2010.
Access to the program hinges on assessments of an individual’s ability
to care for themselves, rather than intelligence tests.

The
program also requires an FASD or autism diagnosis. If an adult meets
these tailored qualifications, a case worker can help them find housing
and work and can assist in running a household and many other needs.

Providing
for young adults with FASD is an issue that sparks a lot of passion
among families and FASD social service providers because the stakes are
high.

“We’ve seen many youth just fall off the rails completely at
that time,” said the Asante Centre’s Salahub. “They’ve lost that whole
child welfare system and they have nothing. If there isn’t that kind of
support system to help them manage some of the day-to-day things, they
get in trouble with the law or they become victims of extreme abuse.”

‘Hell for two years’

Lydia Neufeld has seen her 18-year-old adoptive son with FASD falter just as this adult cutoff looms.

Struggling with academics and discipline, Neufeld’s son began skipping classes in Grade 10.

He
stopped taking the medication controlling his attention problems and
got in trouble with the law. His disability interfered with his ability
to see the costs he paid for his misbehaviour, so he would get caught
and punished repeatedly.

“We’ve had hell for two years,” Neufeld said.

Her
son recently returned home from a five-month jail term and four months
of in-patient drug and alcohol rehab. With one year left to access
childhood services, he’s enrolled in a construction trades training
program.

With modest levels of supervision — somebody to check in
on him daily — Neufeld’s son might be able to work and live on his own.
However, that duty will fall to his family and friends in less than a
year.

Even with a confirmed FASD diagnosis, CLBC’s criteria for
the personalized supports initiative require a very low score on a
psychologist’s assessment of an applicant’s ability to take care of
themselves. Many who could benefit from a support worker — like
Neufeld’s son — are too high-functioning to qualify. Fewer than 150
adults with FASD have benefited from the $10-million program in the two
and a half years since it debuted, according to CLBC.

Neufeld’s solution is to surround her son with caring people who provide positive influences as long as they stay in his life.

She
called his classmates at the private school he had been ditching.
Fifteen of his old friends and teachers agreed to watch out for him.
They invite him out for basketball in the school gym and other
activities. While he’s with them, they help him navigate daily
appointments and abide by his curfew and the other conditions of his
probation.

She sees this as the last hope to steer her son clear
of a life on the streets, cycling in and out of jail. Despite the
extraordinary challenges, Neufeld and her husband want their children to
know they’ll never waver in their care and concern. “We say, ‘Always
and forever, we will love you no matter what, but we don’t like the
choices that you are making. We still love you in spite of those,’”
Neufeld said. “They really crave that, to know they have a place go when
they need it. We’re the only ones in the world that will be there for
them. We never give up hope.”

Friday, October 12, 2012

This post is dedicated to Amanda Todd (b. Nov. 27th, 1996 - d. Oct. 10th, 2012), a brave, beautiful young woman who took her own life this week after being subjected to the most brutal bullying, harassment and victimization imaginable by other young people in our community. This involved both cyber-bullying and real world actions and assault.

“I think the video should be shared and used as an anti-bullying tool.
That is what my daughter would have wanted,” Carol Todd, Amanda’s
mother, told The Vancouver Sun in a message on Twitter.

I hope that young people, parents and others watch this to see what kind of an environment too many of our young people are living with every day. As adults, we must do more to stop this and to intervene earlier for the victims/survivors for this brutality. Bystanders must stop being silent and tell someone if you know of someone being bullied. Amanda Todd: My story: Struggling, bullying, suicide, self harm

On Sept. 7th, Amanda wrote:

I'm struggling to stay in this world, because everything just touches me
so deeply. I'm not doing this for attention. I'm doing this to be an
inspiration and to show that I can be strong. I did things to myself to
make pain go away, because I'd rather hurt myself then someone else.
Haters are haters but please don't hate, although im sure I'll get them.
I hope I can show you guys that everyone has a story, and everyones
future will be bright one day, you just gotta pull through. I'm still
here aren't I?

On Wednesday, October 10th, Amanda was found deceased at home in what appears to be suicide. Her struggle is over and her soul is now at peace. I send blessings and sympathies to her parents and family.

********************************
As a psychiatric social worker, working with youth who are admitted to an acute psychiatric in-patient unit, I have found that almost every single one of my young clients has been subjected to intense, chronic and damaging bullying and harassment by peers in the real world and in cyberspace.

Many switch schools, or even leave school altogether. Families move to get them out the community where they remain targets. Young people have told me about the safety plans they have had to create to get back and forth from home to school to avoid those who lay in wait for them. From what my clients and parents tell me, schools do little, if anything, to assist them and they are left on their own to cope with the devastating impacts of bullying and harassment, which include escalating mental health symptoms (anxiety and depression), feeling worthless, rejected, hopeless and suicidal. They often cannot see a better future is ahead for them.

As adults, we simply cannot ask why bullying is so rampant with young people without holding the mirror up to ourselves. Bullying and harassment is an epidemic in many workplaces. It has become a structural mechanism to create control and domination in the workplace. This a much bigger topic to be tackled on another day.

In the immediate I want to provide some resources for young people, for parents and for others so people can access help.

Friday, September 21, 2012

Lelaine
Muir attended the School of Social Work at the University of British
Columbia and spent her career working as a front line income assistance worker
in the welfare ministry for 34 years. In that time she has seen dramatic
changes in the philosophy, public policy, practice and administration of income
assistance. Lelaine, now retired, kindly offered to write a piece for Advocacy BC on some of her experiences
working with B.C.’s most vulnerable people.

I would
like to dedicate my musings on working the front lines of income assistance in
Vancouver’s urban core to all people on income assistance, past, present, and
future. Some of the finest people I have ever met have been on welfare. Income
assistance recipients are, in my opinion, the most open and honest about who and
what they are. For this I truly respect and admire them.

When I
started working, income assistance workers were considered helping professionals.
While I worked on the front lines of the welfare ministry I attended the School
of Social Work at the University of British Columbia (UBC). To me social work is an honourable profession. We make a
difference in people’s lives by working on increasing quality of life through
building self-esteem, and always moving the client forward towards financial
independence and healthier life styles. In welfare, we were the first line of
defence in recognizing and intervening in child neglect and abuse, addictions,
mental health, social disabilities, criminal activity, and immigration issues.

I have a
number of stories that have stayed with me over the years of my work and they
demonstrate some of the changes the welfare ministry has gone through in how we
treat clients. In the 1970’s while working at a
welfare office on Homer Street in Vancouver, a man entered our building in
distress. He appeared quite ill due alcohol abuse. He had defecated in his
clothing and he had been living in these clothes for days. Our conundrum was
who would transport him to a community social service agency that was able to offer
him assistance. We drew straws and I pulled the short one. My colleagues were
kind enough to cover the passenger seat of my two-seat sports car with
newspaper and helped get the client into my car. They also provided me with a
jar of Noxzema cream to hold under my nose to keep from retching. Holding the
jar in itself was a feat because I drove a standard forcing me to shift and
steer with one hand.

As soon
as we arrived at the community agency the gentleman was taken to a bathroom and
stripped of his clothing so the garments could be incinerated. The gentleman
was then placed in a large bathtub in a large room. The social worker with this
agency was bathing the gentleman when I was brought into the same room. I sat
on a stool in the furthest corner and completed the income assistance
application while the gentleman was bathed. The gentleman was found eligible
for income assistance and medical coverage all within the same day. The client
now had two support groups within hours of contact.

After thirty-four
years with welfare, I came to believe that, in many cases, people were failed
by their families and the adults in their lives when they were young. They were
failed by the school system, by their communities and social service agencies
and society, as a whole. As adults, they are punished because they grew up to
be dysfunctional people in need of support.

Over the
years, many clients have disclosed childhoods plagued by neglect, abuse,
torture, and trauma. Clients have told me about growing up in deep poverty,
alcoholism, drug addiction, family violence, suicide, and even having to eat
food off a dirty floor thrown there by the adults who were suppose to love and
care for them. I have had clients describe being chased out of their beds in
the middle of the night by a drunk, violent father carrying an axe and hiding
outside in winter in northern British Columbia in their pajamas, fearful of being
found.

In
welfare work our goals of service used to be about striving to provide people
with dignity and quality of life. This began to change and soon, it appeared as
though the welfare ministry, now called the Ministry of Social Development
(MSD), refused to acknowledge that a core segment of our society are unable to
function, and most likely never will and they require social assistance to
survive.

Around 2009
a senior manager came to my office to tell our team that we were no longer a
helping profession, we were now a business. When I inquired how we were to make
money off of the poor and disadvantaged the senior manager stated, “By
diverting costs.” In subsequent team meetings my colleagues and I began
brainstorming how diverting costs would take shape and how it would affect
delivery of service. Several times I tried to remind my teammates we worked
with human beings.

In the
spirit of this changing mandate I offered a few helpful suggestions. I
suggested we remove our name, address, and phone number from the blue pages of
the phone book so people wouldn’t be able to find us at all. I also recommended
we build a moat complete with drawbridge and pull up said drawbridge so people
couldn’t manage to make it into the offices. Following fortification we could
let it be known in the community that, if people could find us we may, and only may, help them.

“Diverting
costs” has taken a tremendous toll on the poorest in our province. One day an
administrative staff person approached me expressing concern about how one
particular client was being treated. I looked into the case and discovered a
twenty-year-old woman who was suffering from severe mental health issues. Her
father was in the background trying to support her bid for independence.

During
this process the young woman was approved for Persons with Disability (PWD) classification
by the Health Assistance Branch in Victoria. However the intake worker who had
completed the income assistance application at the local office had not found
her eligible for basic income assistance, almost four months after she made her
application. I approached my colleague with information of the mental health
issues and the approval for PWD. The worker said, “Well now I am going to ask
her to write out how she has survived for the last three months without our
help.”

I felt
it was inhumane to create further delays in helping this young woman, who was suffering
mental health issues, so I called the client. We tried to find a time the young
lady could come in to see me, but there were no available times. I asked the
young lady to come in on my lunch hour. When we met in my office, I explained
her eligibility for income assistance, and that I would make arrangements for
her to receive the funds she was eligible for. The young lady said, “I would
like to give you a hug, but I guess it’s not very professional?” I
replied, “I have had many a hug in my career.” She dropped her backpack, threw her
arms around me, and sobbed into my shoulder saying, “You have saved my life.”

I would
enjoy a good debate about BC’s welfare system, which, in my opinion, used to be
one of the finest. Clients were recognized for their individuality and were
treated with respect and humanity. Plans and goals were devised to meet the
individual’s needs and built on their strengths and capacities. Education,
training, and apprenticeship programs were preferred so clients could find
better paying jobs and more sustainable employment.

Another
client I remember was a single mother who was struggling with mental health
issues. She had a teenage daughter and they needed additional supports because
of her illness. Once the mother was found eligible for PWD, she brought me a picture
she had painted, with a card that read, “I am not much of an artist, but I
wanted to show my appreciation for all you did for us. You kept me hanging on.
And most importantly you treated me like a human being. Something no one else
has done.”

After working
under the new business model I started to apologize
to clients for the system and my inability to assist them. By now my employer had
made clear to me and my colleagues that care, dignity and compassion were no
longer relevant in the welfare ministry. I also found myself apologizing to
social workers with the Ministry of Children and Families, social workers with
the hospitals, staff at facilities, and service providers because services were
being withdrawn from the most vulnerable. Social workers were putting in hours
of work to arrange plans for people, only to find no one at the welfare offices
were available, or no-one knew the clients and could participate in case
conferences and assist in implementing plans that would support clients.

Another
situation that stayed with me was that of a single mother with two small
pre-school children who had approached the welfare office for additional
support. She explained she and her two children were hungry. They had no food
or funds due to bills being higher than usual and unexpected additional
expenses. The worker dealing with this woman told her to go and find free food. I could see that where once we were a helping
profession, now we were creating more stress in the lives of parents who were
already struggling. It is these kinds of conditions that trigger feelings of
anger, despair and hopelessness that can lead to acts of child abuse and/or neglect
when parents have hit walls in receiving help for them and their children.

In
the MSD business model of income assistance delivery, I found no understanding
of social or human issues. This business model does not understand, or care
about the social and health impacts of poverty on individuals’ and families. Nor does this model recognize mental health or
addictions, lack of education and literacy, lack of social skills, lack of day
care or the many ills that befall vulnerable human beings, because it is not
profitable to do so.

Welfare
came into existence because people needed help and there will always be people who
need help due to their own personal circumstances. From what I have experienced,
working in the welfare Ministry over the years, I now believe there is a segment
of society who wish the poor and vulnerable would just go away and die and
clean up after themselves so no one will ever know they were there in the first
place.

People on income assistance can be our
family, friends, or neighbours. Someday it could be you, or someone you
know. The
health of our communities is measured by how our most vulnerable are treated
and far too many in our communities have been deprived of what they need. I
remember a time when everyone was treated with respect and
dignity. With the political will of the B.C. government it can ensure that the
human rights of our most fragile citizens are values that are the foundation of
our welfare system.